The Nonexistent Liberation Front
Having read his editorial against homosexuality as the downfall of civilization in The Rhinoceros Times of Greensboro, NC, I nominate Orson Scott Card as the first president of The Nonexistent Liberation Front. This fanciful organization would champion the right of the non-existent to be granted existence. The money quote follows:
"All the while, the P.C. elite will be shouting at dismayed parents that it is somehow evil and bigoted of them not to rejoice when their children commit themselves to a reproductive dead end.
But there is nothing irrational about parents grieving at the abduction-in-advance of their grandchildren."
"Abduction-in-advance." One has to wonder if Mr. Card, as a novelist, grieves over the non-existence of the imaginary characters in his novels as well.
I nominate pro-life campaigner Matthew O'Gorman as another candidate for President of The Nonexistent Liberation Front. Yesterday's article on This Is London website about breakthroughs in harvesting stem cells from un-fertilized eggs quotes his outrage at the procedure, even though it makes it easier to harvest stem cells without destroying a fertilized embryo or fetus. I suppose a priority of the Nonexistent Liberation Front would be billboards reading "Ovulation without conception is murder."
It will be interesting to see how many steps away from an actual person the "protect the family from attack" movement will get before they will be satisfied that no potential future person is in danger. When we have protected every speck of tissue which is sacrosanct just because it is running a biological process on human DNA, it will not be enough for the Nonexistent Liberation Front. There will still be Orson Scott Card's nebulous abstraction of "society" or "civilization" to be placed in front of tangible individuals getting on with having a life. In the ideal family-friendly world, everyone would live vicariously through their offspring; unfortunately, so would their offspring, with the outcome that no one on this planet would get to live their own life.
"All the while, the P.C. elite will be shouting at dismayed parents that it is somehow evil and bigoted of them not to rejoice when their children commit themselves to a reproductive dead end.
But there is nothing irrational about parents grieving at the abduction-in-advance of their grandchildren."
"Abduction-in-advance." One has to wonder if Mr. Card, as a novelist, grieves over the non-existence of the imaginary characters in his novels as well.
I nominate pro-life campaigner Matthew O'Gorman as another candidate for President of The Nonexistent Liberation Front. Yesterday's article on This Is London website about breakthroughs in harvesting stem cells from un-fertilized eggs quotes his outrage at the procedure, even though it makes it easier to harvest stem cells without destroying a fertilized embryo or fetus. I suppose a priority of the Nonexistent Liberation Front would be billboards reading "Ovulation without conception is murder."
It will be interesting to see how many steps away from an actual person the "protect the family from attack" movement will get before they will be satisfied that no potential future person is in danger. When we have protected every speck of tissue which is sacrosanct just because it is running a biological process on human DNA, it will not be enough for the Nonexistent Liberation Front. There will still be Orson Scott Card's nebulous abstraction of "society" or "civilization" to be placed in front of tangible individuals getting on with having a life. In the ideal family-friendly world, everyone would live vicariously through their offspring; unfortunately, so would their offspring, with the outcome that no one on this planet would get to live their own life.